GL Homes has renewed its effort to build about 3,800 homes on approximately 2,800 acres in the northwest quadrant of Indian Trail Improvement District after trying unsuccessfully to transfer most of those development rights to property it owns in the agricultural reserve west of Boynton Beach.
GL Homes representative Larry Portnoy was at the ITID Board of Supervisors meeting on Wednesday, May 16 to reopen discussion of conditions on its development called Indian Trails Grove.
The company has offered some incentives to ITID, including 640 acres of stormwater retention land, to pay assessments as an activated unit as homes are built, and to pay a $1,500 per unit impact fee, also as the homes are built. Supervisors felt that was not enough to compensate for the impact the development will bring to The Acreage.
One of the conditions that ITID wants to discuss is for the developer to pay a share of traffic-calming measures that the district is installing to prevent cut-through traffic on ITID-owned roads.
ITID Attorney Frank Palin explained that GL Homes has already received comprehensive plan approval from Palm Beach County for 1.25 units per acre, as well as approximately 300,000 square feet of non-residential use and 50,000 square feet of office space.
ITID has been discussing off and on with GL Homes for 18 months or so the impact of the project on Indian Trail’s road system.
“The system is not hydrologically connected to Indian Trail, although they have already, with the assistance of Palm Beach County, committed to provide Indian Trail with the 640-acre parcel, which will allow the expansion of Indian Trail’s drainage capacity,” Palin said.
He explained that GL Homes has renewed its original proposal with the county to build as many as 3,800 homes in the area. That plan was temporarily shelved after the county voted down a development proposal by Iota Carol/Delray Linton Groves to build up to 1,030 homes on its 1,800-acre parcel, which is almost completely surrounded by the GL Homes tract.
Palin said a letter from GL Homes offers some assistance to ITID to offset impacts on local roadways.
“This will be in a cash contribution of $1,500 per dwelling unit, payable upon platting of the subdivisions as the project develops over a period of time,” he said. “At total buildout, that $1,500 per unit would generate approximately $5.7 million over a long period of time.”
However, Palin said that roadway improvements would need to be made before buildout in order to accommodate the development.
“That’s one of the issues we need to address,” he said. “We’ve been dependent upon waiting for the developers to determine what direction they’re going to take. That appears to be clear now.”
Palin said that ITID staff had presented several options on how to deal with the project, but no real policy decisions had been made. He expected the renewed application to go before the county sometime this summer.
“We have some urgency to move forward,” Palin said. “Staff is going to need the board’s direction on some key areas. We’ll be coming back to you on proposals that will require your decision.”
He said that the agenda packet included a standard agreement form for the transfer of the 640 acres from GL Homes to ITID for water retention, although details of how the area will be transformed still need to be worked out, as well as details for roadway improvements east of the future development.
Palin said the development would be using 60th Street North, a county road, as its main access point. “As the subdivision builds up, it will not be putting a burden in Indian Trail roads initially,” he said, adding that Royal Palm Beach Blvd. would probably be the first road that the district would need to focus on.
ITID President Betty Argue said that she wants part of the discussion to include the district’s cost of processing the development request, including staff time.
“That took away from our taxpayers and our ability to do other things, so I think our taxpayers should be made whole with that,” she said. “That’s separate and apart from the $1,500.”
Portnoy said it was his understanding that FPL is buying the Iota Carol property for use as a solar farm, which would not put an additional burden on traffic in The Acreage. He added that he wanted to discuss a letter from ITID’s consultants requesting that GL Homes share the cost of traffic calming on district roads.
“They threw an awful lot in there that far exceeded anything our traffic report, which had been approved by Palm Beach County, had ever addressed,” he said.
He added that GL Homes is putting in a bridge over the M Canal at 190th Street North to get to the west side of the development, which diminishes the need for a proposed bridge at 180th Avenue North.
“There are improvements to 180th, and we are building 190th as a parallel road,” he said. “And then there’s traffic calming all over the place here. Their number came in at $14 [million] or $15 million, which blew our minds away. I hear you about the reimbursements, and it’s certainly something we talked about before. I think it would be prudent to get staff some direction or reel your consultants in a little bit, or we’re not going to get very far in this process.”
Argue said the request for a bridge over the M Canal at 180th Avenue North had been a “pie in the sky” request.
“I appreciate, in response to one of the comments that you made, Palm Beach County did not require you to study your impact on our roads,” she said. “Unfortunately, because of that, we are required to do our own engineering study and look at the impacts, and in looking at that, one of the things that I recall from this discussion was that you’re going to be putting traffic on Hamlin and Orange [boulevards], and there’s an assumption that is being made that all that traffic is just going to go to Seminole Pratt Whitney Road, and we know that it’s not.”
She added that she felt that GL Homes should accept some responsibility for the impact on surrounding roads.
“At some point, we should regionally assess according to the benefits,” Argue said. “Really, the benefits are going to derive from anyone who’s going to be driving those roads, which includes the GL property. It should not be on the backs of our taxpayers. We are the only voice of our residents, and it’s our only authority.”
